The cover art
for Badges of Fury is widely
misleading. With a stern-faced Jet Li facing forward and adjusting his cuffs
with a somber gun-wielding Wen Zhang standing behind him, and a large explosion
silhouetting the both of them, you might come to the conclusion that this is a
buddy action film. In reality, this is simply a comedy that utilizes action for
some of the jokes. All of the violence in the film is cartoonish, even when
deadly, making the style of action more along the lines of a Stephen Chow (Kung Fu Hustle) film.

The film even
flirts with the supernatural when a series of gruesome deaths in Hong Kong are seemingly unexplained. Several men die with
the same mysterious smile on their face, leading two troublesome cops in an
unconventional investigation. Detective Wang is a young and reckless rookie
with more zeal than intelligence, which is the opposite of his seasoned
partner, Huang (Li). These two have different methods, but both are unafraid to
go against police protocol to close a case.

The ideas about
romance buried within the screenplay of Don
Jon are far from original, to the point that each of the film’s twists can
be seen far in advance, but the presentation of these ideas come through unique
characters and original plot points. At the center of the film is a simple
argument that Hollywood romantic comedies are just as unhealthy for the female
mind as pornography is for the male mind, essentially setting both up for
disappointment when life does not live up to their fantasy for cinematic
perfection.

Jon Martello (Joseph
Gordon-Levitt) would be a likely candidate for a new “Jersey Shore” cast
member, spending every day working out and cleaning so that he can spend every
night trying to get laid in clubs. The one thing we don’t see Jon do much of is
work, though his hours as a bartender would likely be during the very time we
see him constantly gallivanting. When Jon meets Barbara Sugarman (Scarlett
Johansson) he wants to sleep with her because she is the most beautiful girl
he’s ever met, but she is high maintenance and leads Jon into a relationship by
dangling sex like a carrot. The problem comes when Jon finally gets what he
wants and is still left unsatisfied. Jon’s reliance on pornography to fulfill
sexual desires is in complete contradiction to the Hollywood
image of romance in Barbara’s fantasy, causing a rift in their relationship.

The Ultimate Life is the follow-up film
to The Ultimate Gift, both adapted
from the best-selling Christian books by Jim Stovall and made for nobody but
fans of the franchise. The faith-based film industry often makes these movies
with missionary attempts at saving mainstream audiences, but they make the
films in such a way that insures only an ability to preach to the choir, so to
speak. This type of insipid tale of religious affirmation hits the same notes
repetitively in an overlong screenplay and dull direction. In other words, this
film is suitable only for your religious grandmother who’s TV always seems
stuck on the Hallmark Channel.

The themes of The Ultimate Life are rather clear, repeating what was already learned
the first time around. Money cannot buy happiness. If you truly need a film
that is nearly two hours long and filled only with poorly written dialogue that
is stiffly presented by the cast to tell you that money won’t buy happiness,
this film may be able to teach you something. I imagine that this kind of
lesson will only be interesting to those who don’t need it, as is the case with
most Christian entertainment.

The Lone Ranger may not be a great film
by any stretch of the imagination, but it is a far more interesting failure
than you might imagine from the overwhelming mass of critical disparagement. It
should be noted, however, that I had no previous attachment to previous radio,
television and film incarnations of The
Lone Ranger, so I was able appreciate this film as a standalone piece of
entertainment without judgment about significant alterations made in the
adapting process.

All of the
criticisms made about this film are most definitely true; the budget was
outrageous and all in an obvious attempt at harnessing some of the success from
the previous Disney/Bruckheimer/Verbinski/Depp collaboration, The Pirates of the Caribbean. The film
is also over-long with some structural issues, like much of Gore Verbinski’s
filmography, and Johnny Depp’s elaborate performance overshadows the title
character and hero of the film. I also saw some unexpected assets buried
beneath all of the excess the film has to offer.

Neill Blomkamp
took everyone by surprise with his debut feature, District 9, able to combine cutting-edge action sequences within
the socially and political relevant science fiction storyline. Elysium has all of the same things that
made District 9 a success: heavy
science fiction, special-effects-driven action, and a heavy-handed political
message under the surface. Aside from the fact that this feels a bit more
forced the second time around, District 9
was a film made in the filmmaker’s home country of South Africa with a message that
was obviously personal in nature. Elysium
is a Hollywood feature which makes some transparent social statements about the
United States
in the narrative. I found this a bit smug coming from an outsider, and Elysium tends to feel heavy-handed with
cinematic soap box themes weighing the spectacle down.

The biggest
problem with the allegories and political subtext in Elysium is how blatantly transparent it is. The story takes place
in the dystopian future year of 2154, in which Earth is ravaged and only the
wealthy can afford to live a healthy life on the man-made space station called
Elysium. This space station also provides perfect health care, which none of
the impoverished citizens of the United States can get. It is
already clear that the film is dealing with issues of universal health care and
immigration, which is pounded into the audience’s head even more obviously by
the fact that apparently all citizens on Earth are Hispanic and all on Elysium
are white. This is an obvious attempt to advance the liberal agenda of
addressing the health care and immigration issues the Unites States deals with
in regards to our impoverished southern neighbors in Mexico. This entire film could have
used a bit more subtlety and intelligence.

James Wan has
made a career as a horror director by simply focusing on creepy dolls and
haunted houses, and it has done wonders for him and the box office sales. 2013 alone saw two haunted house installments from Wan, including
the period film based on a true story, The
Conjuring, and the follow-up to 2010’s Insidious.
Insidious: Chapter 2 is not as
consistent as either The Conjuring, but even amidst a mediocre
film from Wan we are able to see his skill and confidence as a director in this
medium has increased. The over-all film is uneven, but there are still some
terrifying sequences and original ideas sprinkled in this sequel.

The Lambert
family endured a battle with the spirit world in the first film when one of
their children is under threat from a ghost wanting to take his body. In
Insidious: Chapter 2, we learn more about this hereditary trait that allows
members of the family to travel to the spirit world in their dreams. Josh
Lambert (Patrick Wilson) has the same abilities as his son, learned and then
forgotten in his troubled childhood, and returned to threaten his family once
again in an Amityville Horror type
transformation of personality. Meanwhile Renai Lambert (Rose Byrne) does all
that she can to protect her family from the ongoing threat.

The second in the film franchise adaptation of
the popular young adult book series, Percy Jackson: Sea of Monsters,
has plenty of action and excitement to match the first film. At the same time,
it almost just feels like filler material in-between a much larger story. The
first film gave us necessary introductions, and while a few significant
characters make their appearance within the storyline of Sea of Monsters,
little within the plot of this movie seems to hold any relevance by the film’s
close. Characters have a way of undying after being killed off, which makes
much of the action nearly irrelevant. If each book includes a quest of some
sort, this is one which has all of the urgency and none of the relevance from
the first film.

The mission this
time around isn’t even a quest that has been given to Percy Jackson, but
instead to one of the other competitive demigods. There is a barrier
surrounding and protecting the camp where the half-human, half-gods train and
live, and that magical shield is caused by a tree that grew where one of them
was killed many years earlier. After the tree is poisoned by a familiar enemy
from the first film, the only hope to save it is with the Golden Fleece, which
rests on the shoulders of a brutal Cyclops. Another new addition to the
storyline is Percy’s half-brother, another demigod who also happens to be a
Cyclops.

It would benefit these low budget action films to have a simple plot with
minimal cast, but they are always convoluted and crammed with as many
recognizable faces and names as possible. Even with a large cast, the story is
never simple. It is always filled with a great many unnecessary scenes of
serious-faced men proving how tough they are by the way they scowl. And when
the action finally does arrive, it is never as impressive as you might hope. This
may have something to do with the cast of veteran action actors who were in
their prime two decades ago.

Ignore the list
of actors starring in this movie, such as Steven Seagal, Ving Rhames and Danny
Trejo. They are all in this film, but can be considered no more than supporting
actors to martial arts superstar Bren Foster, who is able to bring youth and
speed to the action sequences while struggling to take a stab at the acting
portion of the job. Foster stars as a hitman who is disgraced and dismissed by
his mob boss, Mr. Alexander (Seagal), after a prison hit goes wrong. Years
later he has the chance to redeem himself when he gets caught in the middle of
a gang war with Mr. Alexander and a gangster known as ‘The Iceman’ (Rhames).